*ALICE’S POV* 

“Holy muthering !”

I exclaimed loudly and sat upright on the couch in Hee’s suite that he shared with Silver and Yesung as I was rudely awakened by some kind of a damp cloth covering my face and I could hear the guys laughing loudly in the background. I swear to god, sometimes they just chose a really unpleasant way to wake me up whenever I’m taking a snooze. And what the hell is this thing anyway? I brought my hand to my face and peeled that piece of fabric from my face and nearly puked when I realized that it was someone’s sweaty shirt.

                “Eewww!! Who the did this?!”

And can you believe it? None of them answered me and even laugh louder as I threw the shirt vengefully at Kyu, obviously on purpose but the skinny dude managed to get away though, cackling in the process. I huffed and laid my head back down on the armrest before Hee sat on the couch that I was laying on, picking my legs up so that there was room for him to sit and placed my legs back down on his lap.

                “Baby girl, you do realize that they do that just to hear you curse, right?”

I seriously liked the name that Hee always called me with cause it reminded me so much of Aunt Grace. She’s the only one who called me that my whole life and it felt all cute and fuzzy when Hee called me with that name too. Gosh, I’m starting to really consider going to Hee’s parents and beg them to adopt me just so I can have him as my legit big brother, or something.

                “Seriously though, what’s so amusing about me cursing?”

I asked as I sat back up on the couch, leaning sideways on the head rest with my legs still resting on Hee’s lap.

                “Cause we’ve never seen a girl with a mouth as dirty as yours, basically.”

Yesung mumbled with a flat tone to his voice as he walked past the back of the couch sipping a Pepsi, heading towards the kitchenette area of the suite. I could just look at him in disbelief as he passed by cause he just spoke flatly without so much as a smile, a smirk, or ANYTHING to signal that he was indeed talking about me although it was pretty obvious that he was. Yeah, the dude’s just weird like that.

                “Is the dude capable of talking passionately about anything other than his damn turtle?”

I asked Hee with a questioning look on my face and just before Hee even managed to answer, Yesung yelled from the kitchenette area,

                “I heard that! And leave my turtle out of this!”

“I meant for you to hear that! Serves you right for picking that damn turtle over me last night!”

 Kyu, Ryeo and Sungmin who were also hanging out in Hee’s suite that time all burst out laughing at my yelling match with Yesung. Last night after a press conference here in Shanghai we hung out here and we all somehow decided to start playing 10 Questions in 30 Seconds, in which you need to answer the questions as fast as you can within 30 seconds. So then it was Yesung’s turn to answer, and Silver asked him who would he save if me and his turtle were trapped in a burning house that was about to explode and he only got a chance to save one of us. And guess what? The dude ACTUALLY answered his turtle! Man, I was beyond furious last night and of course the guys found it highly amusing and just couldn’t stop laughing about it all night like they’ve been smoking weed, or something. Seriously, Yesung’s obsession with his pet turtle is just beyond freaky. So me and the guys stayed up all night last night and only managed to fall asleep around 6 in the morning, hence me snoozing on Hee’s suite’s couch even if it’s already 2 in the afternoon. The last thing I remembered last night was that I fell asleep lying my head on Nate’s lap on the carpeted floor and around 9, I woke up underneath a warm duvet in one of the suite’s bedroom, wondering how on earth did I get there. Then Sungmin later told me that it was Silver who took me to the bedroom and tucked me into bed, which I found to be, well… really sweet and thoughtful, making me feel even more uneasy about totally flushing him down the drain when he asked me out a week ago. Ever since I rejected his offer, nothing between us really changes and he’s still as sweet as ever to me, kinda making me feel like… well, he didn’t actually believe me when I said I couldn’t go out with him.

                “Heeey, sleeping beauty is finally awake now.”

A weird knot that has nothing to do with the fact that I haven’t had anything to eat since I woke up suddenly tightened in my stomach as Silver walked in followed by Lee and greeted me like that. Seriously, what is wrong with me? Last time I checked, I’m still very much in love with Nate and I had turned down Silver’s offer to go out with him, albeit indirectly, but why am I now weirdly uneasy whenever Silver was around? Man, when I accepted Nate’s offer to be the group’s photographer I didn’t know that having weird emotional cocktail involving certain members of the group *cough*Nate and Silver*cough* would be included in the job description.

                “Well, more like ‘unceremoniously awakened’ if you ask me.”

                “Really, by who?”

Silver then sat beside me on the couch after he said that, well technically he’s behind me since I’m sitting there across the couch supporting my legs on Hee’s lap. Seriously though, he’s not helping with making the uneasy feeling went away by doing that.

“Oh, I don’t know, one of your LOVELY band mates here, maybe? Whose manhood, by the way, I will have stripped off once I found out who it is.”

                “Alice-noona, you wouldn’t dare.”

Kyu said with the most devilish grin on his face. I swear to god, I still wonder how a guy can look so damn innocent but then actually really evil at the same time. Kyu managed to do that, though. And by how he responded to my threat, I was already pretty sure he was the one who threw that filthy shirt on my face when I was snoozing.

                “Don’t tell me what I would or wouldn’t dare to do, mister, just wait for it.”

                “Man, you sure are feisty when you’re hungry.”

Hee chuckled a little when he said that and surprisingly, all the guys started snickering at that too, passing knowing glances with each other.

                “How do you guys know I’m hungry?”

“Cause your stomach keeps churning when you sleep. The room was dead silent and that was all we could hear.”

My jaw must’ve instantly dropped when Sungmin said that as the guys, even Hee, started laughing again at that. Seriously, I feel so objectified here today, they’ve been laughing at me, like, non stop!

                “And nobody told me or tried to wake me up or something?!”

“Baby girl, in our defense, you look so peaceful, like a baby even when you sleep so… we were kinda torn on letting you sleep or waking you up so you can get something to eat so we just kinda… leave you be. Until Kyuhyun threw that shirt over your face, that is.”

                “Hyung, why did you sell me out? NOW she’ll strip my manhood off of me or something!”

                “Oh quit it, you evil magnae, it’s not like she can’t figure that out for herself!”

Then it was my turn to laugh at those two. But Hee was right though, I was kinda hungry. I looked around the room and noticed that everybody was either eating lunch or was snacking on something. I guess nobody would be interested in taking me out for lunch. Then I suddenly had this brilliant idea, why didn’t I just ask Silver? I mean, I could also see this as a chance to take the bull by the horns and just have Silver as close to me as possible so I can somehow get over this weird… something that I felt whenever he’s around. Hmmm, I sure hope this works. I picked my legs up from Hee’s lap and my seat so that I was facing Silver.

                “According to the guys I’m hungry and I kinda agree to that, wanna grab a bite?”

There was something similar to shock flashed on Silver’s face as I asked him that but it disappeared too quick for me to really think of it as shock. Instead, he just shrugged his shoulders and replied with a quick ‘ok’. Well, that was easy, why was I so nervous before?

                “Hyung, didn’t we just have lunch?”

“So? I’m just gonna accompany her, make sure she gets something to eat, we have that thing with the press this afternoon, right?”

                “Ooh, yeah, right.”

Lee passed a meaningful glance only towards me after his little chat with Silver so none of the guys really realized what he just did and I just rolled my eyes at that. God, he just LOVED these little occurrences where he can tease me about Silver.

                “I’ll see you guys later.”

I said as I stood up from the couch followed by Silver. All the other guys just mumbled see you’s at that, but not Lee, though.

                “You’re not gonna ask me to come with you too, buster? Aish, this rejection hurts.”

I looked at Lee as if he’d grown another leg, this guy is seriously weird.

                “What the ? You said you just had lunch, that’s why I didn’t ask you.”

                “Doesn’t mean I didn’t want you to ask me to come.”

                “You know what, let’s just go, come on you big baby.”

I laughed lightly and rolled my eyes as Lee jumped up from his seat and excitedly followed me and Silver out of the room. As we walked through the hallway, I suddenly remembered that I haven’t seen Nate around since I woke up. The hallway that we were walking on was leading towards Nate’s room and I figured I wanted to ask him if he wanted to join us for lunch.

                “Hey, I’m just gonna ask Nate to join us, okay?”

                “Uh… Alice…”

 Silver called my name but I was already at Nate’s door and had already pushed the bell when I heard him. I heard some scuffling inside the room and a few seconds later, the door opened.

                “Nate, come on, we’re…”

I was cut mid-sentence when I realized that the person who opened the door wasn’t Nate, it was a girl. And man, she was gorgeous, typed with all caps if I may say so. She’s got shoulder length strawberry blonde hair and the typical Korean beauty and a body that’s to die for. I suddenly got a feeling that I’ve seen her before. The girl just stood by the door with a curious expression on her face when she saw me.

                “Who are you looking for?”

                “Um… uh… I’m not in the wrong room, right?”

                “Hey, Tiffany!”

Lee suddenly exclaimed and walked past me, gave the girl a quick friendly hug and started speaking quickly in Korean and Silver then did the same. For a few seconds I could just stand there silently. So this is Tiffany, as in Nate’s girlfriend Tiffany. The feeling of being a complete and utter loser suddenly washed over me. Seeing this girl in person is WAY worse than just seeing her in pictures that Nate showed me and picturing her in the stories that Nate told me about her. She’s like… the epitome of perfect. Perfect hair, perfect facial structure, perfect make up, just… pretty much everything on her was perfect. My god, who am I compared to this girl? She’s a whole lot more beautiful than me and even Lee and Silver seemed to fawn over her in a way that they never did to me. It’s almost as if they were worshipping the ground she walked on and the air she breathed in. I may be exaggerating here, but that’s what it seemed like to me. But the worst thing of all was, well… I know she has Nate in all the ways I could never have.

                “Babe, who’s at the door? Oh, hey guys.”

I was snapped out of my thoughts when Nate showed up and walked over to the four of us. I felt little twitches of pain pulling at my heart to hear Nate called her with that affectionate pet name, and it just got worse as he wrapped his arm protectively around his girlfriend’s waist. Anybody carrying a shotgun right now? Yeah, I think I’d love to have the end of it on my temple and just be so kindly blow my brains out.

“Well, since two of my most favorite girls are here… Maddie, this is Tiffany, my girlfriend. And babe, this is Maddie, well you can call her Alice, my best friend.”

A look of realization spread throughout Tiffany’s face as Nate told her that and then she smiled and extended her hand at me and I shook it swiftly, mumbling a quick hi in the process. Although was it just me or did she look like she’s not that excited to see me?

                “Oh, this is your friend Alice that you’ve been telling me about?”

I noticed that she simply addressed me as Nate’s ‘friend’ although Nate had mentioned that I was his best friend earlier. And why does it bother me so much?

                “Yep, the one and only. I’m so glad you guys finally meet.”

The smile that was on Nate’s face was of pure happiness and excitement that was obviously based on the fact that I had finally met his girlfriend, quite the contrary to what I was feeling. But I didn’t have the heart to let my misery showed cause honestly… he looked so happy that time, I just couldn’t ruin it.

“Um… actually, Nate, I’m on my way out for lunch so I’ll see you guys later, okay? It was nice meeting you, Tiffany.”

I said with the most genuine smile that I could manage even though deep inside, I feel like I just wanted to crawl up into my bed and die right there. Tiffany on the other hand, only lifted up her perfectly plucked eyebrows and gave a half smile. This is seriously draining my energy, I needed to get away and vent just for a little bit, I just… couldn’t stand this.

                “Silver, I need to go to my room real quick, I’ll meet you down at the lobby, okay?”

Silver just nodded at that and I quickly turned around and nearly sprinted towards my room, probably a little quicker than normal but I honestly didn’t care. I reached my room, got in, and slammed the door closed. I sat leaning my back on the door and buried my face in my palms and the next thing I know, drops of tears began falling involuntarily. I rarely cried but at the times that I do cry, the weird thing is that it always somehow involved Nate. All these mixed emotions are all too familiar to me.

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*FLASHBACK*

“Uncle, are you sure Nate believed you when you told him I’m not coming back for his graduation?”

Siwon’s father just chuckled at Alice’s innocent question and brushed his palm on the top of the teenage girl’s head affectionately. He and his family had grown quite fond of Alice over the years ever since he and his son accidentally met her some eight years ago at the company he worked for and had now owned when Alice’s aunt started working for him. He cherished the fact that Alice and his son instantly clicked and had been best friends since then cause he honestly felt that Siwon was at his best ever since Alice came. In the Choi household, having Alice around almost all the time was pretty much a normal occurrence that it almost seemed like Alice was the unofficial member of the family. Siwon’s father had even thought of adopting Alice on numerous occasions but didn’t do so on the base that Alice seemed to have an aunt who pretty much treated her like her own daughter and he thought that it sufficed for Alice so he didn’t really put his thought into action.

“Well, judging on how Siwon’s been sulking for the past two days, I’d say that he believed me, Alice.”

“That’s awesome.”

Alice said with the biggest grin on her face and everybody just laughed at that. It was Alice’s second summer holiday in Seoul after she moved to California two years prior and it was also the day of Siwon’s junior high graduation. Siwon’s parents, his younger sister, plus Alice were all waiting outside of his school’s dome for when the official agenda had wrapped inside the dome. A couple weeks before, Siwon had make sure that Alice attended his graduation after he practically begged and pleaded her to book a flight home before the date so that she’d be there on his graduation. But a couple days before the graduation, Alice had an idea to surprise Siwon. She then told him that she wouldn’t make it to his graduation and even asked his family to join in the surprise too, hence how Siwon’s father had to lie to him so that the surprise could actually happen. Alice smiled to himself as she recalled how mad Siwon was when she told him that she’s not gonna come for the graduation, he didn’t speak to her for two full days because of that. But all of that was about to change, though, so Alice thought. She looked down on the flower bouquet and the present that she had bought for Siwon in her hands and once again smiled excitedly at the prospect of seeing Nate got all hyper as he realized that she was just pulling pranks on him about her not coming for the graduation. This day also meant something more to Alice. For weeks and weeks, Alice had argued with herself back and forth and contemplating on telling Siwon how she really felt about him, how she had been in love with him even since the first day they met. Alice honestly didn’t know how he’d react to that but she also knew that she needed to get it out of her system cause it had been killing her inside keeping her feelings hidden from Siwon. Since Alice went away and moved to California, it dawned on her how much it would mean to her for Nate to know how she felt about him. Her palms started getting damp as she realized how huge this will be, Siwon finally knowing that he’s the only boy that Alice could see and feel these things to and nerves started to take over her. She looked up expectantly as she noticed that the door to the dome had opened and kids started piling out, running after each other excitedly. Alice stood beside Ji Won, Siwon’s younger sister, and waited for Siwon to come out, her heart beating so fast from the anticipation. When Siwon finally came out, Alice nearly screamed. But she was stunned into silence when she realized that Siwon wasn’t alone. He came out of the dome, holding a girl’s hand tightly in his and laughing excitedly with her. For Alice, seeing that literally felt like someone had ripped her heart straight out of her ribcage and threw it carelessly across the field. She stood there completely numb, wondering to herself when do this happen and why Siwon never told her anything about it. As was predicted, Siwon was utterly surprised when she saw Alice with his family and started sprinting towards them, with the girl following him closely.

                “Maddie!”

He screamed excitedly and jumped at Alice, pulling her into a visibly suffocating hug.

                “God, I knew it! I knew you’d be here.”

A strange lump suddenly formed in Alice’s throat and she was unable to reply as Siwon said that. It honestly felt like a surreal blur for Alice at that time. She handed the gifts she was going to give to Siwon and even as he talked quickly about how thankful he was for Alice’s gifts, she still couldn’t find it in her to reply him. But it seemed like it didn’t matter to Siwon.

                “Maddie, come here, I want you to meet my girlfriend Ji Ah.”

Alice’s tears finally fell at that and she really had no power left to stop it. Hearing Siwon said that was like confirming that everything that happened was real, that it wasn’t just some sick joke that he was playing. Siwon turned around and was surprised when he saw tears falling from his best friend’s eyes.

                “Maddie, is something wrong? Why are you crying?”

                “Uh… no, I’m just… so excited for you right now. This is happy tears, see?”

Alice nearly didn’t recognize that voice she spoke, it’s like it wasn’t even her, but that was all she could manage. She hoped to god that Siwon would realize that too, would realize how fake the smile was and saw right through it and then kept pushing Alice to tell him what’s wrong and at that time Alice thought that maybe then she would truly be honest. But that didn’t happen. Siwon laughed instead and pinched Alice’s cheek playfully.

                “You’re so silly.”

That was Alice’s first taste of heartbreak. And the first mask Alice had to wear to hide her true feelings from Siwon.

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I know I said I was gonna post this two days ago but school kinda got in the way and I was, like, drowned in assignments, plus I have to prepare for a remedial test cause I totally failed the final test... :( Anyways, awesome AFF peeps, you know what makes me happy, right? *wink* kekeke :P